‘Bloody’ awful

by

In a campaign season, a raunchy rock
opera about one of our Founding Fathers’ reign of terror could be a
biting commentary and a breath of fresh air. But while the performances
by the talented actors in Peppermint Creek Theater Co.’s “Bloody Bloody
Andrew Jackson” are energetic and explosive, the script by Alex Timbers
and Michael Friedman is puerile mush, reducing serious history to the
base-comic level of Mad Magazine.

It is a historic fact that our seventh
president did, in fact, commit genocide, presiding over the wholesale
annihilation of several Native American tribes. However, presenting a
story of this magnitude in the format of a comedic musical approach is
questionable, but the constant use of coarse language — combined with
incessant pubescent whining — suggests a younger target audience.

There is much audience laughter, but to
what end? The script throws compassion and caution to the wind,
offending with jokes about dead babies, homosexuals, former presidents
and Spaniards. First Lady Rachel Jackson (Mary Maurer) dies of cholera,
and the audience snorts and chuckles as she (prat)falls over dead. Is
cholera funny? When the narrator vomits off the side of the stage, she
is applauded, but why?

Michael Kolaczkowski does a spirited take
on Jackson, sprinting and strutting across the stage, but there is no
real sense of an actual person in the role. The portrayal of other
actual presidents as runway models suggests a view of the political
process that is ignorant, cynical and an excuse for easy
non-participation, inviting us to embrace our inner redneck.